Ranjeet and Sita take vows at the Muffasil police station in Motihari on Wednesday. Picture by Ajit Kumar Verma

Motihari Mufassil police donned the gown of Good Samaritan by getting a widow remarried to her brother-in-law after her husband died last year.

The wedding of Sita Devi (25) and her deceased husband’s younger brother Ranjeet (27) was solemnised on the premises of the Mufassil police station here on Wednesday.

Sita, daughter of Amirilal Sah of Rupdih village, was married to one Ram Babu Sah, son of Shambhu Sah of Gorhwa village (both under the same police station area) in 2007. However, barely after four years of marriage and a son, Ram Babu died because of heavy drinking, sources said.

Soon after Ram Babu passed away, the elders in both the families of the man and the woman, resolved to get Sita marry again, this time with Ranjeet. After the families thought of tying the knot of the new couple, Sita and Ranjeet started living together and ultimately the woman conceived. She delivered the child in January.

This invited trouble for Sita, as her father-in-law started demanding dowry from her father. According to sources, Sita’s father-in-law, found an opportune moment to get her daughter-in-law married to his second son only after her father paid the dowry. After Sita’s father refused to pay the money, Shambhu Sah started torturing the woman.

The torture turned so ugly that the father of the girl, Amirilal Sah, approached the Mufassil police station and requested the station house officer, Ravi Kumar, to register a complaint under cognisable sections of Indian Penal Code.

With the hope of sending a strong message of widow remarriage, Ravi, along with junior sub-inspector Amarendra Kumar Sah, started convincing the groom’s side and also sought co-operation from social activist Shambhu Yadav and local mukhiya (village head) of Gorhwa panchayat Ravi Bhushan Prasad to help him in solemnising the couple’s marriage. “We initiated to get the couple married to send the message of community policing across. We are against dowry and for widow remarriage. The couple has done no wrong and they should get married,” said Ravi.

The matter was negotiated and in the presence of the elders from both the families, the marriage rituals were performed in a Shiva temple on the police station premises on Wednesday.

The newly wed couple looked content after the ceremony was over. “I am very happy. My husband is caring and we hope we will have a good life ahead,” Sita said.